Smarty Pants

One of my most favorite things about being a mom is watching my kids learn and seeing them develop. I am constantly amazed at how much they absorb and how well they imitate.

Sami is a little mommy. She loves taking care of her "baby." She is constantly trying to feed Janie or help me out in some other way. I get such a kick when Sami is trying to pick up Janie and move her somewhere. They are only about 5 pounds apart, but Sami really tries to move her.

Sami loves shapes. She can do a 12 piece shape sorter and tell you almost all the shapes. She loves the star, heart, and oval the best. She knows the difference between an oval and a circle and a square and a rectangle, to which I give most of the credit to Baby Einstein DVDs. She will point out the shapes in books. The other day I was getting Janie in the car and Sami noticed that there was a circle on the window roller-upper thingy. She is learning her colors, but right now everything is yellow, and she says it perfectly. Counting is coming along pretty good too. She says "one, two, five." We'll get there.



My favorite thing Sami does is tell me that she loves me. It comes out like "I wuv oo." That makes my heart melt. What doesn't make my heart melt so much is when she tells me no. This just started happening when we were in Nebraska. And for a while she was in time out a lot for telling me no when I had asked her to do something. I just dread disciplining her. I want to pretend like I didn't hear it, but then I hear in mind "randomly reinforced behaviors are the strongest." And then I try and make myself discipline her. I usually have to make her do what I asked her to do in the first place, like pick up her crayons, then she has to go to time out, with protests all along the way. She has such a strong will. I'm sure she'll need that determination to get through the trials she'll face, especially since the world is getting crazier, so her independence is a good thing. But it is a bit challenging when we both want different things. I guess you could say that the "twos" have officially started in our house.

And Janie is almost crawling! She is soooo close! She rocks back and forth and will go forward just a little...and then fall on her stomach. She is really good at scooting and rolling. I can just see in her little face how badly she wants to run around with Sami. She is at my favorite infant stage: she sleeps through the night and I can always find her where I left her. But not for long.

Jonathan's Trip to Wyoming

So I want to be done blogging about our NE trip. And since blogging isn't such a priority to Jonathan, I guess I'll just blog about his adventure in Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. He had a great time. He loves hiking and was in some of the most beautiful country. They were gone for four days. They slept in tents, or in the back of my dad's truck. Jonathan did all of the dutch oven cooking. My dad and brothers said he was a great cook. Hmmm...I'll have to remember that :).

My two favorite men: my hubby and my dad.



I was amazed that this deer let him get this close.There are lots of buffalo in Yellowstone. I'm glad Jonathan got to see them. He really wanted to see a bear, but I am so grateful he didn't get to see one. I was so worried that they would run into a bear and get attacked. I know...I worry too much.
Three of my brothers went on the trip, as well as Jonathan and my Dad. On the left is Ben. He is married to Marcy, and they have three kids: Julia, Sarah, and Nathan. I admired Marcy for going on this trip. She wanted to go camping and so she went and they took their kids, and Nathan is only 8 months old! I was worried about the kids camping, but Jonathan said they loved it, and Nathan was such a trooper it was unbelievable. (My dad had asked me if I wanted to go camping with my little girls and I remember saying "heck NO" in a very loud voice.) My brother, Danny, is on the right, and Mike isn't in the picture, and neither is Marcy. I'll try and get a picture of them in later.


They camped by this lake for three nights.

On the last day, Jonathan and my dad hiked up the Grand Tetons. They didn't go all the way to the top, only because they didn't have enough time. But the Grand Tetons really are so beatiful, if you haven't been there, you should try to go sometime. It's truly magnificient.

And I leave you with a Hall redneck moment. Jonathan says everytime we visit my family, he's involved in a redneck moment. So here is this years moment: my huge brothers trying to squeeze between two skinny, close-together trees. Danny really did get stuck, and my dad pushed and Mike pulled to get him out. They all told us that story a couple of times when they got back. I'm glad they had a good time. (Oh, and Mike is the big guy in the black shirt. He's my youngest brother.)

I'm glad they had fun, and it was so nice to see them when they got back. Jonathan wants us to take our girls there one day, and I really hope we do. I was blessed to grow up with my outdoorsy dad who made sure we went to Yellowstone often. They are memories I treasure now and I hope my girls will also enjoy family trips to Wyoming.

And the winner is...

Jonathan has been at a medical convention in Tucson all weekend. He entered a poster presentation contest, basically so he could put that he was published on his residency application. And he won first place in the student division! He won $200 and a plaque. And the best part is that he doesn't have to go to Canada!! I know that sounds weird, but he thought that the first place winner had to present in Canada next summer. And while I'm all for world travel and adventures, I'm kind of a party pooper when it comes to leaving the country for a week when we have two babies at home. Or my husband leaving me, as it may be. But we were wrong, he doesn't have to go to Canada. I'm relieved.

Oh, and Sami has pink eye. Boo.

Riverside Zoo

One of our most favorite places in NE was the Riverside Zoo. I hadn't been to the little zoo in over 10 years, so I didn't know that they had a new attraction call the "water pad." Sami was dying to get in the water, so I stripped her down to her diaper and let her have fun. I love these pictures!!

After our first visit, I remembered to bring her swim suit.

This little cutie pie wanted to join in the fun, but it was way too cold for her. The water was freezing (I was surprised Sami liked it as much as she did). So Janie girl sat on the sidelines looking cute. Maybe next year, Janie.


Sami knows all of her animals and their sounds, so to see them all in real life was so exciting for her. She loved feeding the ducks.

There isn't much traffic in the zoo, so the monkeys were happy to see us.

They also had a petting zoo where you could touch a pot bellied pig, llamas, and donkeys. The donkeys really wanted the food (you could buy a handful of food for a quarter). Sami was cautiously thrilled.

I love this hubby of mine!
We loved the Riverside Zoo and can't wait to go back next year!

Homefront

For the past four weeks, the Olsen family has been in my hometown of Gering, Nebraska. Jonathan was able to do an ER rotation there, so we felt blessed to spend the whole month with my family. Jonathan's rotation was super easy for him. He only had to work three 12 hour shifts a week, and the days he did work were not busy at all compared to what he does here.

We had so much fun, our time flew by. We couldn't believe how fast it passed, until we came back and it felt like forever since we had been home. It was fun to go, and nice to come back. The only real downside of our trip was that we all got sick the last week. Jonathan was mostly spared, but us girls were so sick. We are still recovering, but I think the worst is over.

I am going to do a couple of posts about our trip, but I just wanted to do a quick post about some of the things we loved about Nebraska.

Jonathan was able to go camping at Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Tetons in Wyoming. He loved it and a whole post will be dedicated to his trip with my dad and brothers.

We loved swimming. The weather was perfect there and my mom bought a little swimming pool that was just the right size for the girlies. The only problem was that the girls had so much fun swimming that getting out brought out tears and protests.

Auntie Rachel was a familiar favorite at my parents' house. She adores the girls and the girls feel the same about her. She loved buying them presents and playing on the floor with them. We will definitely miss Aunt Rach.



And then there was the zoo. Gering has this cute little zoo, with lions and tigers and monkeys. You can walk through the whole zoo in less than an hour, but it is the perfect size for the munchkins and they had a blast every time we went. This is a picture with my Grandma, their Great Grandma.


And of course we saw lots of cousins. Ben and his kids came from Gillette, Wyoming, and spent several days with us. Ben and Marcy have two girls, Julia and Sarah, and one little boy, Nathan. Nathan is two months younger than Janie.



Ben and Marcy's family:


And Danny. Danny loves his nieces and nephews and Sami got really good about saying "hi Da" for "Hi Danny." He read and played with her almost every day. He lives with my parents while he is going to the community college there. He is the only one of us living at home and I know my parents are glad he's still around.

We had a great month and are so grateful for all the good memories.

Staying Busy

As I have said (many times) before, our summer is like winter everywhere else. We have to stay indoors. And I've learned that Sami needs to stay busy in order to stay happy. So here are a few things that have saved our summer.

Play Dough. Love it.
And this is the perfect recipe. It comes out so soft and smooth. And it keeps really well. I like it so much better than the store bought variety.

Play Dough Recipe:
1 cup white flour
1/2 cup salt
2 tablespoon cream of tartar (find it in the spice section)
1 tablespoon oil
1 cup waterfood coloring
Mix first 4 ingredients in a pan. Add water and mix well. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, for 3 - 5 minutes. Dough will become difficult to stir and form a “clump”. Remove from stove and knead for 5 minutes–add food coloring during kneading process. Play dough will keep for a long time stored in a covered plastic container or plastic sandwich bag.

And then there's magnets. Magnets keep Sami girl busy for hours, literally. Hours at the fridge, hours on magnet boards, and now there's file folders. Our Cozy Nest gave me the inspiration, and I have been so grateful. I got the games for free here (this one's the best, in my opinion), here, and here. I followed Cozy Nest's example of putting the games in a binder and using magnets instead of velcro, making it much quieter in church.
Sami is now a pro at matching and recognizing numbers, thanks to all these games. And I thought it was fun putting them together. I bought a laminator at Wal-mart ($25) and I love it, not only for this project, but lots of other fun things too.

These ideas have kept us sane this summer, and I hope you enjoy them too.

Happy Playing!

Sharing the love

Nothing makes me happier than when my girls play and giggle together. Now that Janie is rolling all over the place, she gets her little hands on toys that Sami thinks are hers alone. So we're learning those hard lessons about sharing and not hitting. But sometimes Sami just gives Janie toys and shares so well. One morning this week, Sami just kept giving Janie her puffs.


Then Sami gave Janie kisses. That was the best part of my day (and Janie's too, I think).


And on a completely different note, don't you just love all of Sami's bling?! She's been putting on all of her necklaces and jingling around the house. This isn't a very good picture, but you get the idea. I just love having little girlies!!